The Russia Is A Superpower Myth
I want to dispense with any notion which claims that the Nation of Russia is in any way a “Superpower.”
Russia’s GDP is 1/14th the size of the U.S. alone and counting the GDP of Europe as a whole it’s more like 1/24th.
(2) Russia’s military budget is less than 1/8th the size of the U.S. and again adding NATO’s military budget it’s more like 1/10th.
(3) Putin has committed 55% of Russia’s military strength to just conquering a practically unarmed Ukraine. This also means Russia’s borders are mostly undefended and there is no replacement forces to defend thousands of miles of unobstructed borders.
This talk about being unable to stop Putin from “pushing the nuclear button” ignores some facts. The first of which is that the U.S. has always been busy finding defensive measures against nuclear attack. We do not know how sophisticated those measures have become and we will never see them revealed because doing so obviously negates the value of those measures. [See #4].
(4) FYI Bulletin: Few non military people know this — not a single military electronic device “produced in Russia” contains any Russian-made electronics! Boom: the Russians are 100% outsourcing their military electronics TO WESTERN SOURCES. So anyone doubting the effectiveness of sanctions (embargoes) had better leave the room. That includes most of the so-called “conservative” spokespersons. Even if Putin “pushes the button” what’s likely to happen is that his nukes will be duds. This isn’t speculation — it’s known fact.
Some may find it interesting that there are parallels between Putin’s Russia today and that of the Japanese Warlords of 1945. They too were committed to all out war but they didn’t know the United States was weeks away from destroying two of their major cities with just two low yield (unguided) atom bombs. In the end they didn’t have any choice but to surrender unconditionally to the United States.
And like Saddam’s Iraq — Putin is nothing but a poker player hoping he can bluff his way to a win of some kind. Saddam’s bluster campaign was shown to be just bluffing- twice. Putin’s statements sound identical to those of Saddam Hussein. We also can relish the memory of how Saddam finally got caught in a “spider hole” and was hanged not long after.
So hopes that Vladimir Putin will turn out like Saddam are quite realistic.